Sen. Bob Hertzberg (D-Van Nuys) has announced that Gov. Jerry Brown has signed his legislation to stop schools from publicly shaming or embarrassing students by denying them lunch or providing a snack instead because their parents haven’t paid lunch fees.

SB 250 ensures that school officials do not delay or deny food to students as punishment for unpaid school meal fees. The new law also directs schools to establish a process for notifying their families about unpaid fees and collecting them.

The legislation received bipartisan support. The state Assembly approved SB 250 on a 77-0 vote and the Senate approved it 40-0.

“When President Truman established the National School Lunch Program, it was based on a fundamental principle that we will feed our kids in school because it helps them learn and respects their human dignity. This isn’t partisan,” Hertzberg said. “When you’re treated differently as a child in school, it’s shameful. And in this case, the child is being harmed as a tool to collect their parent’s debt. That makes no senses whatsoever.”

Students have a harder time focusing and learning when they are hungry, and 23 percent of California children come from families living below the federal poverty line, Hertzberg said. According to a national survey conducted in 2015 by the anti-hunger organization Share Our Strength, 75 percent of teachers said their students came to school hungry, and 59 percent said “a lot or most” of their students depend on school meals as a primary source of nutrition.

In recent years, the practice of school lunch shaming has gained attention. In some school cafeterias, students who haven’t paid lunch fees are directed out of lunch lines and instead given bread and cheese, or their lunches are simply dumped into the garbage. SB 250 forbids that practice and requires schools to make meals available to needy children, even if their fees have not been paid.

Instead, schools must recognize that meal costs are the obligation of the parents, not the children. For families that cannot afford the meal fees, the bill directs schools to find a way to certify students for free or reduced-price meals or to reimburse them for the fees. Additionally, schools must notify guardians when unpaid lunch fees exceed the amount for 10 full-priced lunches.

The legislation was co-sponsored by the Western Center on Law and Poverty, Coalition of California Welfare Rights Organizations, Children’s Defense Fund-California, Food Research and Action Center and SEIU California.

“Our research found that policies which shame children with unpaid school lunch debt are more common in California than we could have ever imagined,” said Jessica Bartholow, of the Western Center on Law and Poverty. “We commend districts that have taken action to end these policies voluntarily, and we thank Governor Brown for signing SB 250 to ban these practices throughout the state.”